George Hotz, the famous iPhone jailbreaker who is more commonly called GeoHot has released a new website called Ra1nb0wra1n that serves to showcase all of GeoHot’s iOS exploits from one place. Visiting the website will let users check through iOS exploits like Purplera1n, Blackra1n, Limera1n besides linking to Apple TV app emulator, console reboot, tethered reboot, etc.

Most interestingly, GeoHot’s new website also has a ‘Coming Soon‘ link that links to ‘Rubyra1n‘. If you have been following this space, you will know that Rubyra1n is the name of the next iOS exploit from GeoHot. Hotz is learned to have purchased the domain name back in March of last year along with Limera1n.

While the latter turned out to be the exploit that has now been used to jailbreak the recent versions of iOS, GeoHot has not revealed much information on Rubyra1n. We expect this exploit to be released soon after iOS 4.3 is released. What do you think?

Those of you who have jailbroken your iPhone or iPod Touch may have inevitably used the Cydia app store to browse and install one of those applications not available on the Apple App Store. Now Jay Freeman, the developer of Cydia has released a new version of his app store that will make it easy for users to easily reinstall previously purchased applications using the ‘Manage Account‘ feature.

The new feature is extremely useful for users who have upgraded their handset to a new iOS firmware or for users who have upgraded to a new handset altogether. Jay Freeman has also indicated that yet another Cydia update is on the cards and that this new version should come with features to rate and comment on apps besides backing up the installed jailbreak apps.

Technically, it is not illegal to jailbreak the software of any device that you “own“. The Digital Copyright Millennium Act had stated last year that jailbreaking an iPhone or any other device for that matter was not illegal. Apple had stated back then that though the process itself might be legal, the company would still stick to its policy of voiding the warranty of devices that indulge in jailbreaking since such hacks were the primary cause of iOS crashes and malfunction.

Now, with the cat and mouse game between Apple and jailbreakers still on, it looks like Apple may be seeking legal counsel on this subject one more time. The company is learned to have to have approached the Copyrights Office of the Federal Government seeking a “crack down” on hackers who offer jailbreak software. In their proposal, Apple has said,

“Current jailbreak technologies now in widespread use utilize unauthorized modifications to the copyrighted bootloader and operating system, resulting in the infringement of the copyrights in those programs”

Specifically, Apple has pointed out that such jailbroken devices are a way for users to pirate copyrighted software and hence the company wants a ban on such processes. The response from the Copyrights office is not known yet.

If you have been following the iOS jailbreak scene, you will be aware that Apple had recently released a beta version of its iOS 4.3 firmware that among other things brings personal mobile hotspot to GSM variants of the iPhone. Now, if you are a developer who has signed up to the iPhone Developer Standard/Enterprise programs, you may already have access to this upcoming iOS firmware in beta variant that you can install on your iPhone.

Now a new custom PwnageTool bundle that can jailbreak this beta version of iOS 4.3 is now out for those of you interested. Do note that the procedure is extremely complicated and do not proceed unless you are an advanced user (if you have access to the Developer Standard program, you probably are already one!). The creators have pointed out that you will need a Mac for the process. Also, the PwnageTool bundle for iOS 4.3 beta requires users to create their own ramdisk and will not upgrade baseband during the jailbreak process. Also, it is a semi-tethered jailbreak and you can find the downloadable here.

In any case, this is a complicated procedure and do not proceed unless you are well aware of the potential consequences.

Firecore, the developers of the aTV Flash software for Apple TV have now come up with a new product that will let users jailbreak their second generation Apple TV. Called Seas0nPass, the application would let users install custom IPSW firmwares for their Apple TV devices.

Please do note that at the moment, this is a tethered jailbreak. This means that you will need to connect the Apple TV to a computer every time you want to boot. Also, as with any jailbreaking process, deploying this tool could potentially brick your device and probably void your warranty. So, it goes without saying that you need to proceed at your own risk.

The Firecore team has posted a comprehensive how-to guide for the jailbreak process. You can check the tutorial here and please do let us know how the process goes in the comments below.

For those of you who have been working with the iPhone Dev Team in their beta testing of the new untethered jailbreak solution, you must be aware of some issues that prevented Skype from working correctly with Redsn0w untethered jailbreak. The Dev team has now released a new beta software – the sixth such release – that apparently fixes these Skype issues.

Users who already have a jailbroken iPhone running the beta 5 version can run the latest version directly over this version. These users have to “run beta6 and deselect every checkbox”. The Dev team has acknowledged a few other bugs that are still present on the beta test version – primarily with the Wi-Fi Sync app crashing the JB Monte process. We expect these issues to be sorted out in the next release.

Also, the Dev team has pointed out that a Windows version shall be released “only if we can make it less painful“. No time frame has been given for the completion of this.

The iPhone Dev Team has released a new untethered jailbreak solution for beta testers. The new download comes with a couple of improvements. Firstly, Bluetooth – which was disabled in the jailbreak software until now, has now been enabled. Also, the Dev Team has noted that any sandbox related issues must be fixed in the new version.

While this version is closer to a public release (you may recall that the Dev team had indicated that if beta 4 goes well, the next version could be a public release), it is still advisable to go ahead with this download only if you have already tested the older beta versions. Interestingly, a basic version of Redsn0w for Windows too is apparently available although the Dev Team points out that this version is very slow at this point. A test release should be out when the Dev Team manages to speed this up.

George Hotz, the popular PS3 and iOS hacker who is responsible for a number of hacks on the two platforms in the past is out with a video that demoes a Sony PlayStation 3 that has been jailbroken to run a custom version of firmware 3.55. But before you get excited, we must point out that this is merely a demo video at this stage and an actual jailbreak software is yet to be released. GeoHot has refused to offer an estimated time for release at this stage.

You can watch the video demo here.

For those looking for a background to this story, German hackers fail0verflow had recently released an exploit that they claimed could let users decipher the digital signature that Sony encrypts on its Playstation devices. This signature is used by the device to authenticate applications before they are run. GeoHot had earlier this week used this exploit to make the security keys of Sony PS 3 public. Now that a demo video is out, you must expect a jailbreak application shortly.

Late last month, we discovered the Rubyra1n.com domain name registered by popular jailbreaker George Hotz. The domain name was registered on the same date as Limera1n and had the same WhoIs details as one of GeoHot’s other domains; Blackra1n.com.

Now what comes of Rubyra1n remains to be seen. But if we are to go by something that popular Dev Team jailbreaker Musclenerd has to say, we could be seeing an untethered jailbreak for iOS 4.2.1 sometime soon. In a tweet posted on his account, the jailbreak developer has said,

“I hear geohot does have an untether actually! Though not for all devices.”

Does that mean we could be seeing a public release – similar to the Limera1n release – soon? All this is mere speculation at the moment since GeoHot is an independent hacker and so Musclenerd’s guess is only as good as ours. In any case, we would like to see if an untethered jailbreak from GeoHot is on the way.

George Hotz, the popular hacker who is widely known as GeoHot in the jailbreak circles has made Sony’s PlayStation 3 security key public that could enable users to install custom firmwares and games on their console without going through the Sony platform. Thanking the German hacker group, Fail0verflow who discovered the exploit, Hotz wrote on his blog,

“props to fail0verflow for the asymmetric half. no donate link, just use this info wisely. i do not condone piracy”

The security keys are significant in that it is assigned to every legit application and is used by Sony to verify if any particular application the user is trying to open is legitimate or not. By making this security key public, software pirates can open copyrighted gaming applications illegally.

Sony is yet to acknowledge the issue and we hope they act soon enough to minimize the damage caused.